


in this dire time (we dare to hope)

by visixns



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bantering, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, I love these kids, I wrote this for literally ten hours straight, it's really not that bad I promise, literally my idiot children will pun their way out of emotional trauma, so much bantering, these kiddos are funny asf, you know I'm right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-24 17:06:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21981394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/visixns/pseuds/visixns
Summary: "Twenty-year-old fashion designer and university student Marinette Dupain-Cheng was recently revealed to be Paris’ famed spotted superhero Ladybug in a viral video sent to the Parisian Police Prefecture late yesterday evening before being mass broadcasted to TF1’s news channel LCI for public viewing. The video, long since confirmed authentic by authorities, portrays the fall of the red-and-black heroine’s transformation to reveal what appeared to be an injured Mlle. Dupain-Cheng leaning protectively over another injured man, presumably her black-clad partner. The anonymous source left the video with a single message stating that the heroine and her partner Chat Noir will be held hostage until further notice, the latter of whose identity was promised to be revealed by midnight tonight by way of another video. The police are currently working tirelessly to locate the Parisian superhero team. In this dire time of need, we dare to be hopeful of our beloved protector duo’s safe and timely return. This is an ongoing investigation."In which Marinette Dupain-Cheng and Adrien Agreste find themselves in a tying, trying situation, and the world can do nothing but watch.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Alya Césaire/Nino Lahiffe
Comments: 45
Kudos: 608





	in this dire time (we dare to hope)

**Author's Note:**

> finally found the fic(s) that sort of inspired the "broadcasted" aspect of this oneshot, and you guys should totally check them out! They're "Even Heroes Have Heroes" by ShadeOps21 and "Longest Night" by P_Artsypants (though I've never fully read the latter as I am sensitive to gore, both of these authors are incredible and you should give both of them a read!)

_"Twenty-year-old fashion designer and university student Marinette Dupain-Cheng was recently revealed to be Paris’ famed spotted superhero Ladybug in a viral video sent to the Parisian Police Prefecture late yesterday evening before being mass broadcasted to TF1’s news channel LCI for public viewing. The video, long since confirmed authentic by authorities, portrays the fall of the red-and-black heroine’s transformation to reveal what appeared to be an injured Mlle. Dupain-Cheng leaning protectively over another injured man, presumably her black-clad partner. The anonymous source left the video with a single message stating that the heroine and her partner Chat Noir will be held hostage until further notice, the latter of whose identity was promised to be revealed by midnight tonight by way of another video. The police are currently working tirelessly to locate the Parisian superhero team. In this dire time of need, we dare to be hopeful of our beloved protector duo’s safe and timely return. This is an ongoing investigation."_

Tom replayed the newsreel again. And again. And once more for good measure, because if he was able to keep it together for one reason it would be to see that split second image of his daughter, his strong-willed and determined Marinette, whose eyes looked so confused and frightened in those seven some seconds as she enveloped her partner in a half-hug. His daughter who also happened to be Ladybug. His daughter who was missing and injured and he wasn’t even sure if she would make it back and if she did he was so afraid that she wouldn’t necessarily make it back _alive—_

Sabine sat down beside him with another cup of tea, as numb, if not more, to the tearful voice of Nadja Chamack playing on a loop in the background. Twenty-seven and a half hours since reported missing via the video. Twenty-seven hours gone and a little over half an hour left until the supposed reveal of their darling daughter’s partner is broadcasted as well. Tom flinched as he heard his wife change the channel.

 _“—Don’t be bemused, it’s just the news. Paris sits on thick nerves tonight as the hour draws closer to the reveal of Chat Noir’s identity. As citizens, our hearts go out to the Dupain-Cheng bakery, where the friends and family of Ladybug have gathered to show their support to Mlle. Dupain-Cheng’s parents in this trying time._ ” Nadja paused for a moment, recollecting herself through tears and clenched jaws. Tom and Sabine braced themselves at the mention of their names and at the knowledge of what Nadja, their family friend, was about to say. Tom didn’t want to hear it. Sabine, knowing her husband, grabbed his hand before he could run.

“ _I knew Marinette. She was sweet and she was kind. Kinder than anybody else that I’ve had the pleasure of working with. And now, knowing her identity, it is no surprise at all that our beloved Parisian heroine turned out to be our everyday ladybug as well._ ”

Tom wanted to sob. He felt absolutely, utterly, completely sick.

The little clock on the corner of the live-screen counted twelve minutes until midnight. Twelve whole, excruciating minutes until they would find out whether or not their little daughter was even alive to begin with, whether or not the first video had held genuine proof of life. Twelve minutes that strung Tom’s sanity teasingly over him like a toy.

From somewhere back in the kitchen, Sabine could just barely make out the quiet muttering of Nino and Alya as they brewed coffee, both of whom had spent every second since the airing of the video at the bakery. And thank god for it too, because if it hadn’t been for Nino’s quick thinking and Alya’s phone calls to Nadja and the police, they would’ve had to make the trek down to the station despite barely having the willpower to move from their seats. It’d been a bone-chilling, absolutely numbing night, alleviated only by the steady presence of Marinette’s best friends. If only Adrien could have stopped by too. Sabine knew his schedule probably didn’t allow for him to get away at all, but it was pleasant food for thought nonetheless. The poor kid—he’d become too thin lately, dangerously so Tom had once noted, but he was always kind, always as warm as sunshine. They could see why their daughter had crushed on him for so long, why she was dating him.

She wished Adrien could’ve been here too. Marinette would’ve liked that so much, all of her favorite people in the same place, albeit the reason for their gathering was rather grim.

“Here,” Alya’s whisper was quiet as she replaced the mug of tea in her hands with another housing coffee, Tom’s own drink brought in by Nino. Quiet and dejected, nothing like the shrill fondness that had reverberated through the bakery only three weeks prior when Marinette had brought her and their other friends over for Christmas dinner. Nothing like the sheer ferocity and determination that laced her words when she’d interviewed Ladybug—and therefore Marinette, her sweet, sweet daughter Marinette, she had to keep reminding herself—for her growing journalism blog. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Sabine wanted to scream.

“Has Adrien returned your calls?” Alya asked, the mug already halfway to her lips as Nino’s forehead creased in concern. The countdown on the screen read roughly six minutes to midnight.

Nino sighed, scrolling through his phone, presumably through the messages app. Sabine laid her hand above the boy’s though her eyes never left the screen. Five minutes and forty-eight seconds until midnight. “No, and I’m beginning to worry—he doesn’t really handle shock well. I was planning to stop by tomorrow morning to check up on him and bring breakfast, although I’m not even sure he’d be at his apartment. Last I talked to him he was at Marinette’s.”

Her name hung in the air, thick and tense and so painful.

The door to the bakery jingled and the sound, normally so insignificant, lost in the sea of the thousand other sounds rumbling through in the pipelines of the building, cut through the four of them like a chainsaw, messy and loud. And all at once it became _too much,_ and suddenly the air was vacuumed out of the spacious bakery like a windstorm, and Tom couldn’t handle staring at the T.V. anymore, couldn’t handle doing anything really, and oh, he was most certainly panicking again.

It was a wonder, really, how quickly he turned away from the screen, just as some of Marinette’s other friends filed in, holding pillows and blankets and cups upon cups of what he assumed to be coffee. So much coffee.

Nathaniel, a frequent visitor of the bakery and a close friend of Marinette’s that Sabine recognized, shrugged helplessly as Alya ran over to help them with their load. “I’m sorry.” He simply said. “I’m so sorry.”

Nino cleared his throat awkwardly as Kim and Alix settled their blankets on the floor by Tom and Sabine’s legs. Just close enough to offer comfort but far enough to avoid seeming overbearing. “Well,” he started, looking nervously at the screen. Four minutes. “There’s no point in moping around. Marinette would want us to look on the brighter side, and I know that’s what I’m going to do. For her sake. Plus, I’m sure the police will be able to find some bearing after this new video. And I’m sure it’ll be better than we fear it will be. I’m sure—“

Nadja’s face became frantic and Nino faltered, staring in dumbfounded confusion as the clock read just below three minutes. It couldn’t air earlier than announced, could it?

 _Of course, it could!_ He wanted to kick himself. It’s not like super-sick-psychos were obligated to play by the rules of their own games—the very divergence from the norm is what made them dangerous in the first place. He didn’t get to speak on this confusion.

Perhaps, _just perhaps_ , this was for the best.

The screen went blank for the longest of seconds before it was replaced by an image that, despite her greatest efforts, despite the help of countless therapists throughout her life and despite having scrubbed dry the back of her eyelids with tears, Alya would never forget. Or any of the other bystanders, for that matter, she was sure.

Marinette, wild and absolutely livid, positively growled at someone off-camera. Someone that was likely trying to hurt her.

_Hurt Marinette._

“Don’t you dare touch him.” She seethed, and it took an odd something seconds for everyone to come to their bearings enough to realize she was talking about Chat. The blood on her hands was not her own, they noticed—hoped, rather—and were proven right only moments later when, after several beeps of his ring, the shaking figure of the cat-themed superhero melted away, shielded from the camera only by Marinette’s lithe body.

“This one is for the viewer’s at home: I always keep my promises, don’t I?”

Marinette laughed but it was cold enough to make Alya wince. She’d never heard her best friend laugh without mirth, without the warmest of intonations. But she also hadn’t known she was Ladybug.

“Ha!” Marinette spit. “Take your bullshit promises elsewhere and leave him alone.”

The perpetrator didn’t hold her tongue, shooting back a sarcastic “And do you also want me to let you go and give away our location while I’m at it?”

“It would be very well appreciated, I assure you.”

There was a moment of silence and Nino quickly finished the last of his coffee before training himself back on the scene before him. From somewhere behind Kim and Alix, someone sniffled loudly. He assumed it was Tom. Or Sabine. It wasn’t until a minute later when Alya stroked his back that he realized it was simultaneously them _and_ himself.

“Move aside.”

Marinette shrugged disinterestedly and Alya almost threw her phone at the T.V. in frustration. For what exactly she wasn’t sure, but her best friend’s stubbornness could easily be substituted for a reason if she couldn’t find a better one. Mhm. It totally could, because it was about to get her killed—

“No.”

 _Jesus Christ._ She was convinced Mari had a death wish. Or something similar, at the very least.

“I said, move aside.” Each word was painfully executed, boldly accentuated in a hissed breath. There was no room for argument, and yet their friend continued to argue.

“Sweetheart please, just move _aside—"_ Sabine said—no, begged, she definitely begged—at the image of her daughter but it was to no avail. Marinette shrugged again, her arms tightening around her partner as he sat hunched over, his own bloody fingers curled and staining his blonde hair. He didn’t seem very conscious, and if he was, well, Chat was unusually good at staying still for prolonged periods of time.

“Very well. There is more than one way to skin a cat.”

Marinette snarled, and it was not human. Not in the slightest. Alya braced herself for the absolute worst, and she could see her classmates, her family, doing the same. She was going to be sick, and not for the first time that night.

“I—I can’t look, I’m sorry—” she choked, head burying quickly into the crook of Nino’s collarbone. He reached for her, fingers automatically finding her own. Despite the facade he forced on for the sake of everyone else falling apart around him, Nino Lahiffe was absolutely, positively not doing well. Not in the slightest.

“If you so much as touch him you’ll pay with blood, you can rest assured,” Marinette whispered, and though her eyes were shooting daggers through and through, her voice trembled. Her hands shook. She was paling with every word she spoke because speaking took energy, damn it, and she was very clearly hurt. No one in the Dupain-Cheng bakery knew which was worse: the knowledge that she could die before their very eyes due to natural (enough) causes like blood loss, or off-camera from something else altogether like torture. They preferred not to give it much thought.

“I’m not so sure you’ll be able to do much in your condition, but please, do humor me.”

It was then that the camera focused on her hip, where the end of her shirt and the beginning of her skin had become indecipherable with the sheer volume of blood that caked the area. Marinette—no, Ladybug—struggled on her feet for a slight second, eyes hazing over as fatigue clouded her face. Weakness, she showed weakness, and Alya almost full-out sobbed right then and there. And she would’ve too if it hadn’t been for sudden confusion of seeing of a hooded figure approaching her best friend.

This was a stark difference from the first video—the body image of one, if not the only, perpetrator made all the difference. Alya allowed a glimmer of hope to sing carols merrily in her ribcage.

Until the hooded figure swiftly drew a handgun and pointed it directly on Marinette’s forehead.

Had Sabine screamed? She wasn’t sure. It was possible, but it could’ve been any number of people currently frozen in their seats in shock before her. It might not have been her voice. Maybe it was, but it didn’t have to be. Even if it had been, who was to blame her?

“Move.”

“No.”

“Must I explain everything to you in plain detail, you idiot?” The man—woman? It sounded more like a woman, Alya noted, surely an observation she’d go over with the task force assigned to Marinette’s safe return—shouted. They pressed the barrel of the gun so hard to her forehead that for a moment Ladybug had to fight to keep her head still, visible to Alya only because she was looking at her neck instead of her face, she couldn’t bear looking at her pained face and had seen her throat muscles tense. “If you don’t move, you get shot. If you move, maybe you don’t. It’s truly not that hard.”

Marinette pursed her lips. “Sounds to me like there’s a chance that you shoot me regardless of what I do. In any case, I prefer to go down protecting my partner, thank you.”

A shot was fired to the ceiling, and everyone except Marinette flinched violently. And yet somehow, _somehow_ , she just stayed her ground, Chat starting to stir behind her sluggishly.

“Mar-marinette—“

“Sh, _mon chaton_ , don’t speak, just—um, just sit still.”

So they knew one another’s identities. Or perhaps they’d recently found out. Alya let herself wonder for a moment if she’d ever get to interview Marinette, Ladybug, or whatever else she wanted to call herself, again. To Alya, the broken woman before her on the screen was her best friend, her sister, perhaps the only one she’d lay her life down for—save the Lahiffe kid sitting beside her. Any name she wished to be called would be fine by her, as long as she just came back safe and sound.

“That’s very sweet and all, but you’ve already delayed my reveal by nearly half an hour.” A quick look at the clock by the T.V. wall confirmed the figure’s accusation. “Now move aside and I won’t hurt your ‘little kitty.’ Not by too much, anyway.”

“How many times must you get rejected until it finally sinks in, _connasse_? No means no.”

“Fine. I’ve just about had it with you anyway.”

And then the figure shot at Marinette, though the whereabouts of the injury remained concealed by the figure’s shadow. And then she fell, silent and bleeding and very pale, to the ground, a thousand apologies in her eyes as she reached for Chat. And then Adrien’s voice gave a hollow screech, his face suddenly visible in the absence of Marinette’s body as he scrambled painfully for his girlfriend.

Nino became stiff as a board beside Alya. “A— _Adrien_?”

“Well, well,” the woman laughed. “Adrien Agreste, supermodel and apparently a spandex extraordinaire, eh? Wouldn’t have thought it, but what an unlikely duo we have here. How did your father, the great Gabriel of all people, ever let you out of the house with that hideous cat-suit on, Jesus, am I right folks?”

She looked down at the two for a second before clicking her tongue, disinterest and boredom slipping like molasses from the tone of her voice, thick and heavy and ugly. “Okay then. That was fun. Short, but fun nonetheless.”

The figure turned to the camera, and everything they’ve ever known came tumbling, crashing, falling down.

Because before them stood Lila Rossi, smiling smugly with the handgun in her hands. She pocketed it slowly as though time itself bent to her will, grinning ear-to-ear before chuckling at herself. Someone behind Nino vomit, and he almost high-fived them because _same, dude._

In the background, Adrien peppered Marinette’s face with frantic kisses, her body pooled on his own broken lap as he searched for any which way to hold on to her, even if for a bit longer. Suddenly a lot of things made a lot of sense, but at the moment the last thing Nino had the energy to do was to put two and two together. The DJ’s eyes twitched. Alya noticed. It wasn’t a shock when he looked over and found her crying as hard as he was.

Their two best friends, masquerading day and night to protect their beloved city. Their two best friends that, perhaps because of distrust on their end, couldn’t share their identity with them and now they were hurt. They were dying. And all Nino and Alya could do was to play the role of the sorrowful witness.

“Well, not sure when we’ll see each other again, Paris, but tonight’s been fun. Stay tuned!” Then with a devious wink. “Bug out.”

The image cut and Alya couldn’t remember much else before she lost consciousness.

* * *

The police were at the house for hours the next day. After a deep analysis of the video footage, they’d come to the conclusion that despite Marinette going down on-screen, her wound would likely not be fatal judging by the way she fell, and while it could pose problems later down the line if not treated properly, it would—hopefully, they’d said—not cause a threat to livelihood.

There were a lot of “hopefully’s” that went around that morning, one of them for Alya’s quick awakening. A quick look at the clock read that it was already past eleven in the morning, hours past her natural waking hour—almost a solid twelve hours of disrupted, granted, sleep, and while Sabine was impressed, she wasn’t surprised. Her and Nino had fought tooth and nail to keep her and Tom afloat for the first twenty hours—naturally, that kind of emotional weight was bound to explode.

And explode it had. Not a moment after waking up had Alya spent not crying. 

For one, Nino explained quietly to their concerned friends and family, Alya was blaming herself for not realizing their identities sooner—she was the famed Ladyblogger, after all, and had prided herself in being the quickest source of the superhero couple (not that she would ever use that information for ill if she'd known, but maybe she could've pointed the media in the other direction to save their identities, helped out somehow, someway). For another, she was blaming herself for not coming to Marinette’s aid earlier, when Lila had conspired their entire lycée classroom against her best friend and she’d simply believed the claims without any proof or evidence—which was, of course, completely contrary to everything she stood for.

Alya was breaking apart and not a single person could do anything but watch.

“She’s just,” Nino pursed his lips together. “She’s just feeling very guilty. Give her some time, and she’ll get herself together.” Then, with a short smile in her direction, he added fondly: “She always does.”

Kim, Alix, and Nathaniel took over the cooking responsibilities for the day and Luka played a constant soothing melody to drown out the sound of Nadja’s voice once again looping incessantly in the air. Tom and Sabine were in their rooms, and Nino was running around making sure that everything was running smoothly.

He kept moving, checking in with everyone, going out and grocery shopping, working the cashier in the bakery, doing everything and anything because if he stopped moving he was afraid he’d start crying.

And if he started crying, well, he didn’t think he’d be able to stop. So the next best thing was to never start to begin with.

Come that evening, Nino called down the Dupain-Cheng’s to the dinner table. There was something mischievous and ancient in his eyes, an amalgamation of playfulness and sadness. A wondrous, and in this moment, unbearable mix.

“Please, whatever you have planned, don’t do it.” Alya croaked, but Nino just clucked his tongue, eyes sweeping the scene before him. The little table with eight wooden chairs occupied by hunched shoulders and sniffling noses. He handed them all their plate of food before a small melody begun to replace Nadja’s voice altogether.

It was Marinette and Adrien’s favorite song, and Nino had plugged his phone to the T.V. to play it. Sabine winced. Tom gripped his fork. Alya, his sweet Alya, shut her eyes tightly to the point of injury.

“They wouldn’t want this, especially when there’s nothing more to be done on our end.” His voice, surprisingly, didn’t waver. No one except Luka looked up. “Marinette always told me the worst anxiety of all is worrying about things that are out of our control and that the best remedy is a time well spent with loved ones. So we’re going to play a game. For their sake.”

Nathaniel looked like he wanted to object, but Nino shot him a look that gave no wiggle room for argument. “We’re going to go around the table and recall every moment that either Marinette or Adrien gave a ridiculous excuse to get away during an akuma attack. I’ll start: back when akuma’s had just begun to pop up in intensity, I was once stuck in Adrien’s room, and he told me he was going to take a quick shower. When I asked him why the fuck he’d shower in the _middle_ of an akuma crisis, this asshole just winked and said, and I quote, ‘I dunno, it must be the model in me.’”

There were a few chuckles, and Nino almost fist-pumped the air in victory. Because right now, anything except for wallowing was a victory. 

“I don’t know how I put up with his weird excuses to be honest—like, at some point he didn’t even try to make up something that, at the very least, made sense!”

“Once Marinette told me that she’d forgotten to feed her hamster. She doesn’t even _have_ a hamster…” Alya’s voice was quiet, laced with regret and guilt and something deeper than simply agony, but it was there, and that’s all they could ask for.

“Once Adrien said that he’d forgotten to lock his car and ran out. We were fourteen. He didn’t even have a bike then, let alone a car.”

“At least that’s not as bad as when Marinette said she got into a motorcycle accident, and when I asked when and how she literally drove her motorcycle directly into the tree in front of us and said ‘would you look at that, I’m going to go get medical help now’ before calmly walking away.”

“Oh my god is _that_ why she was limping for the next three days?” Sabine wondered, looking at Alya incredulously. By now, the girl was laughing.

“Probably!”

“After they started dating, Adrien used Marinette all the time as an excuse. Once he told me that he’d forgotten to kiss her good morning before running away. This was at eleven at night, mind you.”

Kim and Luka laughed loudly. “Marinette used Adrien all the time too!”

The mirth died down fractionally, and it was Tom that spoke then. “Do you think they knew? About each other, I mean?”

Alya nodded her head, surprising even herself with her sudden conviction. “I think so. Nino and I always wondered how they’d suddenly grown so close seemingly overnight. Them finding out seems like the most sensical explanation.”

Tom pursed his lips, nodded his head gently.

Then, Alya’s phone started ringing, the name _Nadja Chamack_ plastered on the Caller ID. Heart in her throat she threw Nino a confused look before answering on speakerphone.

“Hello?”

_“Turn on the T.V. right now.”_

“What, why?”

_“Just do it. I don’t—I don’t think I can explain this over the phone, you have to see it.”_

Somehow the T.V. had been turned on. It could’ve been Luka, by the looks of it, who stood in the living room with the remote in his hand. The rest of the group trudged over in fear.

On-screen, Lila sat on a single arm-chair beside a tied Marinette and Adrien. They sat on the ground with their backs to one another, a rope that was clearly squeezing too tight tying their torsos together. Marinette’s head lolled forward, chin on her sternum. Adrien’s head was on her shoulder, eyes fixed on the ceiling but by God, they were open, his. breath coming out in short puffs of white air.

A clue: it was cold where they were kept. 

An obstacle: Alya had no idea how to use this information considering it was the middle of January, and so back to square one she went.

“So the next tweet we have is by user @chatnoyrforever—cute name, by the way—asking ‘God for my favorite superheroes to return, currently wondering why bad people exist in the world.’ Well, @chatnoyrforever, I hate to break it to you but I’m not sure I can address the former half of your question. As for the latter half, well, sometimes it’s just fun to be bad, you know? It's exciting. You should give it a go sometime.”

She threw the piece of paper in a small bin by her feet before picking up another one.

Out of the corner of her eye, Alya could see Adrien’s fingers stroking Marinette’s. She didn’t seem conscious. She wasn't sure if that was for better or for worse.

“Okay, onto the next one. This tweet is by user @pierrebug, wondering how ‘A sick asshole like Lila Rossi would want to hurt the kindest two people Paris has ever seen. I wonder if she’s an akuma victim.’ Well, for one, I’m not currently akumatized, if that’s what you’re asking. For another, not everything has to have a motive, darling Pierre. Sometimes you do things to teach people a lesson, and sometimes you do them because you feel like it. Ladybug embarrassed me in public by outing my lie, and it turns out she’s also the same annoying girl that kept trying to make my life a living hell back way back when. Sure, it was because she was trying to prove that I was indeed a pathological liar, but like, you don’t have to shout it out, you know? Like, get off my dick, let me live. It’s not like any of her other classmates were smart enough to pick it up, and it would’ve been fun to continue it too. But I suppose this is a far more entertaining revenge, for all parties involved.”

Someone on the ground snorted. “God, you’re such an asshole, Lila.” Marinette’s voice was barely there, but Tom clung to it like a lifeline, like the first cool breeze after a year of heat-stricken drought.

Alya, well, all she could do was gape at the screen.

“Tsk, last I checked hostages couldn’t speak without permission.”

“Last I checked, you don’t rule my life.” Then, with a lot more rage and a teasing lilt to her tongue: “Get off my dick, you know?”

Lila positively seethed, and Marinette cocked her head, chuckling again before a kick to the stomach drew the air from her lungs. Lila settled back in her seat, thigh-high boots glistening in the dim light, and Adrien scrambled frantically backward to loosen the ropes around her abdomen, give Marinette the space to breathe in their tied situation.

“Alright, next tweet. This one is by—actually you know what? I’m growing a little tired. Looks like tonight’s episode of ‘Celebrities Read Mean Tweets’ is over. I’ll come back when these assholes learn how to behave on camera. Although I truly am disappointed in Adrien; he should’ve had at least some semblance of camera etiquette from being a model.”

Then she left, walking left-screen as the _click-clack_ of her heels reverberated through the room. Luka was about to close the television when Sabine, head turning the gears that hadn’t worked properly in days, grabbed his hand. Surprisingly, the camera hadn’t clicked shut yet.

“Marinette, why do you insist on talking back?” Adrien’s voice wasn’t as quiet, as strained as Marinette’s had been, but Nino could tell the tears just by the hitch in his breath. “She—she’s going to keep hurting you a-and I don’t, _I can’t—_ “

He then sighed, falling quiet, almost enough to be unintelligible. “I _can’t_ lose you.”

When they returned, Sabine swore she was going to propose to Adrien on Marinette’s behalf. Any boy who tried this hard to keep her daughter out of trouble had already passed the first tier of requirements to be her son-in-law.

Marinette sniffed. “I know, _chaton,_ and I’m sorry. I just, I can’t just sit here and watch her hurt you. I have to do something and if that means keeping the attention off of you by way of annoying her then so be it. You’re already hurt enough as is—I don’t even want to entertain the thought of what’ll happen if your wounds get worse.”

No one addressed this revelation.

“Yeah but you’ve been _shot_ Marinette!” He hissed. “And you didn’t wake up and I was so worried and I almost wished that it had been me because I’d rather die than to live in a world without you an-and I just can’t do it anymore, I can’t keep seeing you put yourself in danger and for what? _For me_? I don’t have anybody but you, Mari. You have so many people counting on your return—I have no one but you and Nino and Alya but if I had to choose between them having me or you, I’d always, _always_ choose you. They deserve better than me.”

Nino flinched, but Marinette was laughing, and he could just barely make out Adrien’s tense shoulders as he tried to turn and look at her. “ _Mon chaton,_ you truly are an idiot, you know that?”

“What?”

“Now do you see how I feel every time you needlessly throw yourself in the line of danger for me?”

“Yeah, but that’s because you have your miraculous ladybugs to fix everything, to bring people back. Even me. I—I can’t do that, and I would prefer you make it out rather than me. I’m expendable, you’re not.”

Marinette nodded in thought. “Okay, now I want you to take that logic, flawed as it may be, and apply it to my situation. Right now, are we dealing with an akuma?”

Adrien shook his head, a minuscule movement amplified by the stillness of everything else around them. “No.”

“Which means…?”

Alya watched as something clicked inside his brain, and he slumped further in his seat, paling slightly. “Which means that all damage that is done is permanent and irrevocable.”

Tom and Sabine stilled in their seats. They’d accounted for everything but this.

And yet Marinette was smiling, at peace with the words that slipped from her lips. “Exactly. And I’m doing everything I can to get her attention off of you because my sweet, clueless boy, as much as you say you can’t live without me,” She turned her head so that they were cheek-to-cheek, soul-to-soul. “I can’t live without you either. And we're in this together—it's you and me against the world, remember?”

A pause, a moment of contemplation, a moment of silent revelations. “You’re just saying that because you think I’m attractive.”

“Mhm, you bet I am, hot stuff.”

Adrien laughed quietly. “I am a supermodel after all.”

“A supermodel that masquerades at night in a tight-ass skintight spandex suit, _mon minou._ I wouldn’t put my head too high in the clouds.”

“It’s not spandex! You and I both know that our suits are made of indestructible fiber—“

“I love you, you know that?”

Adrien paused, smiling into her cheek. “Yeah, I do. I love you too.” Then he laughed at something that, perhaps, was off-camera before grinning again. “Yeah, yeah, Plagg, you’re an asshole, you know that? I should be able to say I love you to my girlfriend in peace.”

“Sap.”

“You’re the one that started it!”

Marinette would’ve continued to laugh too if it hadn’t been for the jolt of pain that spiked through her nerves when she moved her shoulder to the side.

Adrien seemed to notice. “How’s your shoulder?”

She shrugged with what little energy she could muster. “I’m pretty sure the bullet went clean through, so I’m not too worried about anything being stuck inside the tissue but,” she rolled her eyes, bit her lip tightly. “It still hurts like a bitch."

"How's Tikki? Can you transform or—?"

"Well," she glanced nervously at something in the bend of her shirt's collar before sighing, a quiet sound that rang silently throughout the apartment. "She's still...unconscious, and I can't exactly feed her without food."

Alya could pinpoint with scary accuracy the exact moment she realized that Marinette was missing her earrings. A little bit of searching proved resourceful when she spotted them clipped to the waistband of Adrien's pants, only visible for half a second because of how he shifted to accommodate for her shoulder. And Chat Noir's famous ring, well, that sat snuggly on Marinette's ring finger. Despite herself, Alya grinned at the ingeniousness of it all.

"What about you? How's Plagg?”

“These ropes are actually holding my abdomen together so I’d say pretty good. Also, the glass is still lodged pretty tight so there isn’t much blood flow out of the wound, which is also arguably good too. And Plagg, well, he's too weak to do much besides throw quips at me.”

“Mm, speaking of which, do you think we could safely break a piece of the glass to cut these ropes or no? I’ll return it back to your guts, I promise,” she joked. He gave a breathy chuckle.

“I don’t think so, it’ll jostle too much and I’ll bleed out more than my comfortable share. It’s a miracle it didn’t hit me anywhere vital to begin with. Well, besides my abdomen in general.”

Marinette winked, despite her back being to her partner. “I guess you could call it miraculous.”

“I hate you.”

“What! I thought you liked puns, no?”

“Mari, I can’t believe you’re making puns amidst this absolute cat-astrophe.”

“There’s my _chaton_.”

He snorted.

“Hey, um, I know this is a solid one-eighty degree shift from what we were talking about but, if I don’t make it, will you tell my parents something for me?”

The room which had been entranced in the light banter of the heroes on-screen jolted to attention at Marinette’s mention of her parents. Nino didn’t even want to spare a glance in their direction. It would be too much—he couldn’t do that, not now.

“I don’t even want to consider the possibility of leaving here without you but alright, shoot.”

“Just, tell them I’m sorry, okay? Sorry that I hadn’t told them about my double life. Alya too, because I’m sure she’s been in a clusterfuck of emotions since that first video was sent out—if it was even really sent out, that is. Lila could be playing us for all we know.”

He nodded against the back of her head, acknowledging the suspicion bubbling in her throat.

“A-and tell them all to not blame themselves. My papa and Alya especially. Maman, well, it’ll hurt but she’ll find a way to move on knowing I loved what I did and that I did it willingly, but my papa and Alya…I know they’re bound to get all dramatic thinking they could’ve somehow stopped whatever will happen to me, to us, but they couldn’t. If you see them, tell them that I’ll personally throw hands from the afterlife if they so much as utter a single word of self-deprecation. I don’t want them to mourn that I died—I always knew in some way or another this sort of situation would happen. I want them to celebrate my life instead; could you tell them that?”

“Of course.” Adrien choked.

“And tell them that I love them. Always.”

“Mhm.” He said, because if he’d try to form any coherent string of words, Adrien knew he’d only let out a loud sob in its place. So he stuck to noises instead, hoping it was enough.

“Sweet, okay. I feel tons lighter now that that’s off my chest.”

“Could you tell Nino that I love him? If I don’t make it that is?”

“Always.”

Nino looked away from the T.V. as his best friend continued. “Tell him that he’s been one of my truest, and absolute best friends since we’ve met. His kindness knows no boundaries, and I can’t thank him enough for that—for making me feel normal, and making me feel loved. Tell him I’m sorry for not telling him about my identity as well. And Alya too, for always being that sweet, incessant voice of reason. I love that crazy girl with all my heart. Honestly, I can’t thank any of you enough for the life you’ve blessed me with.”

Marinette squeezed his hand, leaned her head on his shoulder as best she could. A small act of kindness running marathons in his heart. _He loved his lady._

“Also tell your parents that I love them too. I’ve never felt more at home and safe than when I’m sitting in your living room with you on one side, our idiot friends in front of us, and your parents on the other. I couldn’t have asked for a better family.”

“Marry me.”

Alya shrieked—she was positive she shrieked.

“W-what?”

Marinette shrugged with her good shoulder again, grinning cheekily in her best attempt to face Adrien. “I said marry me. This is a proposal, cat-boy. You gonna take me up on it or what?”

“I—are you serious?”

“Is that a no?”

“No! It’s a yes! It’s a big, giant, green yes! Yes, _of course_ I’ll marry you!”

Marinette made a funny, considering face, clearly taking amusement from her flustered boyfriend—fiancé, now, and it was such a sudden, wild progression too—behind her. “So then what’s with the hesitation?”

Adrien huffed. “The hesitation, _mon cherie_ , is that I was planning on proposing for months on end, carried around the ring literally everywhere waiting for the perfect moment to fall down on one knee, only for you to beat me to it in a dramatic and frankly kind of romantic life-or-death situation! It’s not fair!”

She laughed and it was filled with blossoming bluebells, colorful and lively and so very sincere. Adrien most positively swooned.

“So when do you want the wedding, model-man?”

“As soon as we’re out of here. Literally, as soon as we’re out. I’ll pay for everything, we’ll get a wedding planner and be wed in two weeks, tops. Does that sound good?”

“I’ll be honest _minou_ , there are no complaints on my end. I'm even wearing your ring. Let’s do it to it.”

“Cool, it’s settled then, bugaboo. Tell me, are you ready to be a kept woman?”

“Oh baby, you bet. I was born ready.”

It was at that moment that all of Paris fell in love with the unveiled heroes that sat torn and broken before them. The sheer comfort, the hope, the kindness—it all seeped from every crevice of their words and pooled onto the darkened room around them. They joked in a situation where most would hiccup sobs through, miraculously finding the light even in the dimly lit air around them. They were Ladybug and they were Chat Noir—they were kindness and consideration, love and gentleness, and creation and destruction; whether either be used for better or for worse. They were yin and yang and they were irrevocably intertwined from the very bases of their souls.

That evening would later be pronounced as the national Ladybug and Chat Noir holiday in France. Not the day they were revealed to be heroes, not the day they were rescued, and not the day they were wed. No—tonight, that very night where these two heroes, no older than the ripe age of twenty and no younger than nearly a decade worth of saving their beloved city, found enough solace in one another to bring warmth into even the coldest of Parisian nights.

The live-footage of Marinette and Adrien kept playing until morning came, and even until midnight drew closer again the next day, giving the police an almost unruly amount of footage to dissect. But little do the perpetrators know, that the more time the police held on to a live feed, the more the likelihood of locking on a location grew. Checkmate.

Ladybug and Chat Noir would come home if the Parisian police had anything to do about it.

This time on the couch of the Dupain-Cheng bakery/apartment however, some twenty people sat anxiously holding their coffees close to their lips like a prayer practiced. Chloe and Sabrina had come early in the morning bearing gifts and more drinks, the former of the two helping Luka and Nathaniel in the kitchen (which would’ve been a shock if it hadn’t been for the slow yet steady progress she’d been making ever since lycée, even becoming one of Marinette’s closest friends in the latter half of their time together). Rose and Juleka had come later on in the afternoon, blankets and pillows in hand, and Juleka even brought Luka’s guitar for him. The bakery which had grown cold in the absence of Marinette Dupain-Cheng and Adrien Agreste now buzzed with warmth once again as countless friends and family huddled close, if for no reason other than emotional and physical comfort.

Even Gabriel Agreste sat awkwardly in a chair by the kitchen table, a sleepless Nathalie rubbing soothing circles on his back as she leaned her head on his arm. Gabriel chatted quietly with the Dupain-Chengs and there was a silver ghost of a smile on his lips, one that Chloe almost swore reached his eyes.

It was sometime past ten in the evening when the live-feed of Marinette and Adrien sleeping shifted to something indecipherable. They could only grab the quick image of a blue door before the camera hit the ground with a loud crack.

“Has this been rolling the entirety of the past day?” Lila’s voice shot daggers through the quiet chatter of the apartment.

“Shit,” another voice—male this time, Alya observed—hissed. “I think it was.”

Though the clip now played lopsided, Sabine could just barely make out Marinette beginning to stir from her slumber before her eyes grew wide, choking a throaty _wait!—_ before the eerie and unmistakable sound of gunfire burned through the calm. A sickening slump followed and Marinette struggled against her bonds to Adrien in an attempt to help whoever was behind the camera that had been on the receiving end of Lila Rossi’s anger.

“Mari wait—ah!” Adrien choked and she immediately stilled, obvious that it was the memory of his wound that chilled her so.

“Oh my god, _oh my god,_ are you okay _chaton?_ I— _”_ A whisper, panicked, her eyes still trained on someone the audience couldn’t see. Sabine hated it. Tom, the giant baker with a heart of gold, looked like he was about to pass out from the fear in his daughter’s eyes alone.

Though no one could blame him.

“It’s okay just, please, sit s-still and don’t panic—I’m bl-bleeding again—”

It was truly whiplash-worthy, the number of things that all seemingly happened in the span of the ten minutes they’d spared to look at the screen. As Marinette bucked gently against her restraints to alleviate Adrien’s pain, the door they’d previously seen splintered in half. Though the camera could barely register the sudden onslaught of armor-suited men and women rushing in with trained weapons, Nadja Chamack’s voice was clear when it interrupted the chaos.

“ _In a shocking turn of events thanks to the tireless work of our Police Precinct, we witness the raid of the den in which famous Italian diplomat’s daughter Lila Rossi kept Mlle. Marinette Dupain-Cheng and M. Adrien Agreste hostage for the whole of the past three and a half days. To better catalog the raid, we now join Officer Lumière as he films the event live from his body camera.”_

The screen changed, replacing the steady, crooked angle of the fallen camera with the shaky body-cam of the aforementioned officer. Chloe bit her nails raw as she witnessed two of her closest friends frantically untied by several disembodied hands, Marinette’s panicked voice ringing rounds through her brain.

“Mlle. Dupain-Cheng, we need to take care of your wounds—”

“No! Take care of Adrien first!” She shrieked, jerking free as soon as the ropes came undone, pooling at her waist. She was quicker than they’d expected, turning around just in time to elegantly catch Adrien’s slumping body with trembling fingers and lay him on his side, opposite to the pooling red around his hips. With a steadier voice, she continued instructing the officers as the whole of France watched, captivated as she pushed her fingers gently into the blood to stop its flow, tainting her hands in sharp tones of crimson. And yet Marinette pressed forward despite the sweat beading at her forehead, despite looking pale and woozy herself.

“Several pieces of glass entered into what I assume is his lower pelvis, though we figured it didn’t hit anything vital. One piece in particular though made an incision about nay deep—” she made a measurement just shy of an inch with her fingers. “That I suspect hit him in the _transversus abdominis,_ though I could be wrong. It bled quite a bit and the rope pressed against the two ends of the cut hard enough to keep his skin together and halt more possible blood loss. But the glass is still inside, and you have to help him—what are you doing?” She jerked as the officer grazed her shoulder and her hips, both of which were also caked in enough blood to make Sabine dizzy.

“Mlle, there are officers who will help him but you need medical attention yourself before you can help Chat Noir, so will you please come with me—”

“No, wherever you take him I have to be by his side, please, do whatever you must do to me by him.”

“Very well then, please follow us.”

She didn’t make it two steps before losing consciousness, the loud yelp of Officer Lumière catching viewers off guard in a wracking shoot of fear. He caught her easily though, lifting her lithe, small body in his arms without even the slightest trace of a grunt before continuing behind the stretcher that carried Adrien Agreste’s body.

Shortly before they reached inside the ambulance the clip cut. Nadja wiped at her eyes, not at all inconspicuously.

“ _In a thankful shift, our prayers have been answered. Tonight Paris can rest easy, knowing that our Ladybug and Chat Noir will spend the night safe and sound. Goodnight France, and thank you, our beloved Mlle. Dupain-Cheng and M. Adrien Agreste, for being our light in this darkest time.”_

Alya was numb as she ran outside to her car. Even more so when Nino, Chloe, Luka, and Nathaniel squeezed into her small sedan wordlessly. It was truly incredible how she even managed to start the car despite not having felt herself do so, despite not knowing where she would go—though this detail, in particular, was quickly fixed as Chloe dialed the police station.

“They’re at Hôpital Necker,” Chloe muttered to Nino, who was in the front seat trying desperately to calm his shaking hands enough to dial in the address into the GPS. “Oh God…”

“Go, Alya, drive!”

She hit the gas and didn’t dare look back. 

* * *

The hospital wasn’t nearly as crowded as Chloe expected it would be, but this was likely because the precinct had done their best to not disclose the location of the two superheroes whereabouts. The group burst in haphazardly and the nurse immediately took notice of their woebegone eyes, already suspecting the reason for their entrance.

“Dupain-Cheng and Agreste?”

Alya nodded furiously.

“Monsieur Agreste is currently in the O.R. and won’t be fit for accepting guests until an hour after his operation is finalized, which is estimated to be within the span of the next four hours. As for Mademoiselle Dupain-Cheng, she’s under morphine and unconscious. I’m sorry, but only family is allowed visitation rights until further notice.”

“That’s fine. Where’s the visitor room?” Chloe spoke for them, quiet in her tone, almost gentle.

“Down the hall and to the left, first door after the bathrooms.”

With how fast Alya had driven, she didn’t think it was possible to walk in and see Gabriel, Nathalie, and the Dupain-Chengs already situated in the seats closest to the OR doors, but here they were, and she supposed this was the least of her worries for the night. Collapsing into a random seat, she closed her eyes.

This would be a long, long night. 

* * *

She was right.

It’d been nearly six hours before Adrien was out of surgery—some complication or the other apparently caused a delay in the operation, though the doctors insisted it wasn’t anything fatal. As for Marinette, she was still knocked unconscious, chest slow to rise and even slower to fall. But they were here and they were alive, and that’s all they could really ask for at this point.

“Go fish,” Nino said sleepily, throwing his cards down in front of Luka, Nathaniel, and Chloe. Alya creaked an eye open to look at them, a grin pulling slowly at her lips.

“You’re playing UNO, babe. Not Go-Fish. And you’re supposed to hide your cards.”

“Idiot doesn’t know the first thing about defeat,” Chloe chortled before throwing down her Take-Four card in the middle pile. “Check-fucking-mate, dumbass.”

“It isn’t chess either,” Luka’s quip was short, laced with a yawn. “I win. Do I say ‘bullshit’ or ‘blackjack?’”

Nathaniel, his face in his hands to hide laughter, groaned. “Neither! Do any of you idiots actually know what we’re playing? You’re supposed to say _UNO_ to announce that you have one card left, none of that headassery y’all keep substituting. And even then you don’t win until you get rid of all your cards. _”_

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Nat, do I _look_ like a ‘Poker’ connoisseur to you?” Nino huffed, squinting behind his glasses as he read the cards in his palm.

“UNO. We’re playing UNO, Nino.”

Luka ran a hand through his hair, stifling the sleepy, bubbling laughter in his chest.

“You know what? I’m going to go draw instead because unlike you asshats, these pens don’t test my patience.”

“Whatever Kurtzberg.”

“Girls, girls, you’re all pretty and I have no cards left. Does this mean I win?”

Nino and Luka were both quick to shout a loud _no!_ at an absolutely shit-eating Chloe, whose amused laughter was pulling even Gabriel and Tom into a ring of small, nearly inaudible chuckles. Sabine just smiled softly at them, all the kids sprawled on the ground with their paper cups of coffee littering the floor and their cards spewed all around. Luka’s phone was playing a soft guitar riff and Chloe was sending too many snaps for Sabine to keep track of, mostly of Luka and Nathaniel’s shenanigans. And Nino? Nino was just tired, resting his head on Alya’s thighs.

“Are you all visitors for Mlle Dupain-Cheng and M. Agreste?”

Sabine jumped at the new voice, turning to find a young nurse smiling kindly down at them.

“Yes!” Alya practically shouted.

“Mlle. Marinette is awake if you wish to say hello. Normally visiting hours for patients just out of trauma allow only for the family but seeing as these patients are very—for lack of a better word—special, we’re willing to make an exception.”

The nurse winked at them.

Sabine gulped. “Can—can we see her? Now?”

“Yes! Follow me!”

When they walked in, Marinette really was awake, though Sabine wasn’t sure why she thought the nurse would lie. Perhaps it was the sheer weight of every truth that she learned in this past four-something days, or perhaps it was because her daughter’s speedy and safe return was the best scenario that she’d prepared for. And, in her experience, best-case scenarios seldom ever happened.

“Maman,” she croaked sheepishly, a gentle smile on her lips, an IV cord stretching from her wrist to a machine behind her. A small red toy—nope, definitely not a toy, it just moved to caress Marinette’s cheek—nestled into the crook of her neck. She eyed all of her friends, amused. “Glad to see you’ve brought the whole ensemble, Papa.”

And that’s when the damn broke. “Oh, my sweet child.”

Tom hugged her as best as he could without jostling her shoulder, Sabine simply choosing to sprawl on her lap instead. It was quiet for a moment, unspoken apologies exchanged via the looks her parents gave her. She wanted to comfort them, console them, but the IV would only let her do much, and she was just so tired…

“Girl, you had us so worried,” Alya’s voice wasn’t strong enough. Nothing about her was strong enough, she was beginning to notice, but Marinette just gave her one of her blinding, trademark smiles. It soothed over her heart like a balm on a burn, freeing and calming and utterly refreshing.

“Come here,” she said to her and Chloe, both girls moving in to hug her as her parents shifted around. Luka and Nathaniel settled for giving her hands a squeeze, whereas Nino softly kissed her forehead.

“Marinette, be careful with your arm, your IV’s moving!”

Unsurprised by the red bug-creature’s ability to speak, the everyday ladybug in front of them shrugged. “It’s okay, it doesn’t hurt.” Then she turned to them, stroking the red creature’s head softly. “Guys, I’d like you to meet Tikki, my kwami. She’s, um, she’s the one who transforms me into Ladybug.”

“Hello! I wish we could've met under a better circumstance.”

Her audience waved, dumbfounded.

“She can also do a lot of cool things like phasing through solid objects and, you know, accelerating my healing process.” Marinette moved her bandages to the side despite everyone’s outright refusal to show that the bullet wound was already half the size of what it had been.

The kwami breathed harshly. “Before you blame Marinette, know that I wouldn’t let her even share her identity with Chat Noir at first, let alone her friends and family. If anyone should be blamed for the secrecy, it should be me, though I don’t think any blaming should be necessary at all. Except for not doing enough to save Marinette. I—I was admiteddly too spent to be able to do anything because using her powers makes us tired and she did so much to try and fight Lila but it was to no avail and I'm so sorry I allowed this to happen to her and I'm never going to forgive myself—”

Marinette kissed the kwami's forehead, humming softly. "Tikki calm down. It's okay, we're alright."

No one said a word. The kwami simply cuddled closer.

“We’re just glad you’re both okay, girl,” Alya whispered, tears dotting her eyes despite her fighting tooth and nail to fight the growing knot in her throat. “I—I don’t know what I would do without you, Mari.”

Marinette gave a fond smile. She would’ve said more too if it weren’t the nurse that suddenly burst in, eyebrows creased and looking more and more disheveled by the second.

“Mlle Dupain-Cheng? Monsieur Agreste is—um, he’s refusing help from doctors until he has ‘inarguable proof’ that you’re, well, alive, and we weren’t exactly able to calm him down and he’s becoming a little violent…”

Once again Marinette didn’t seem at all surprised, leaving her family wondering what exactly else had transpired between her and Chat Noir in all those years of fighting Hawkmoth.

“I’ll be right over.”

“No, wait Mademoiselle Dupain-Cheng—”

But she’d already eased out the IV, already pushed aside the blanket that covered her bandaged hips and bare legs.

“Accelerated healing, remember?” She whispered, before asking the nurse to lead her to Adrien’s room.

The group followed curiously behind.

Adrien was…not acting like the precise, poised Adrien they knew—the Adrien that had a supermodel reputation to upkeep, the Adrien that stood tall and always smiled. No, this Adrien outright flailed on his bed, his shoulders pinned down by his father and another nurse until he locked eyes with Marinette. His bucking ceased, mouth hanging open before he too burst into tears, burying his head into the crook of Marinette’s neck. His fingers clutched frantically at her and she whispered something unintelligible into his ear—a lullaby, Alya realized a while later. One that she recognized too: the same lullaby that Adrien’s mother used to sing to him on bad nights, Marinette had once explained.

He calmed down some, still leaning heavily on her good shoulder, still too bygone to do much else besides hug his fiancee's waist. Her gown was tear-soaked but she clearly didn’t mind, curling her fingers over and over again through his hair as if to pet him, his purring rumbling through the quiet room and catlike in all its glory. Inconspicuously, Marinette slipped a ring onto his finger. He responded in kind by carefully putting her earrings on.

The red kwami joined a black one on Adrien’s pillow, and Alya pulled all of her friends out of the room to give the two the privacy they deserved after days of public broadcasting.

After all, they had all their lives ahead of them for idle chat.

For now, Alya had a wedding to plan.

* * *

Marinette and Adrien, despite the doctor's disapproval, slept in the same hospital bed for the remainder of their time in the hospital. It wasn't ideal, but with Tikki's power of creation and luck, both patients surprised the staff with miraculous levels of healing in record time. They were discharged not a week later, almost in full health but with a quip from their doctors to avoid hero work until further notice.

Since the day their identities were revealed, Hawkmoth's attacks completely petered out, despite being very little as of late to begin with. Gabriel Agreste, unbeknownst to anybody but Nathalie as the masked villain all together stopped his work in shame and grief, putting his miraculous inside a silver box before dropping it off at the steps of the hospital, a post-it note attached with only a single sentence.

_I'm sorry._

Marinette cried for a solid three hours as she hugged Nooroo, placing the miraculous with unsteady hands into the miracle box. Adrien, amidst kissing her senseless in relief, told her that Master Fu would've been proud.

The media had been surprisingly kind in not following the unmasked superheroes in their day-to-day life, although upon getting back to university both Marinette and Adrien quickly became swamped with get-well-soon letters and requests for autographs alike. It was a bit overwhelming, but Adrien knew it could've been a lot worse. Signatures and smiles were the least of his worries to give.

Not too long after, the police released a statement explaining the arrest of Lila Rossi, who's only explanation for her actions had been "I've been wondering who they were for a long time, and Hawkmoth's been too much of a pussy to do anything about it." Naturally, this didn't hold up too well in court.

As promised, the black-and-red superhero duo was wed within the two-weeks of their hospital release in a private wedding (much to the media's chagrin) held in a beautiful botanic garden just shy of France's border. Marinette had sewn her dress herself, using something borrowed from her mother as the base of the gown and something new from Tikki to commemorate her work as Ladybug. The red, black, and green accents on her dress sparkled under the sun on that winter day, and Adrien winked as he showed his own red and green tie to match her color scheme. Gabriel, sitting front row and shouting his son's name in excitement come day-of, had to admit that out of everyone his future daughter-in-law could've turned out to be, being both Ladybug and a fashion-prodigy certainly was as best a package as he could ask for. Adrien still wasn't sure what prompted his father's sudden spike of love, but he wouldn't complain, basking in his embrace at the afterparty instead.

Nino and Alya teased the two relentlessly. Seriously, the wedding guests were one embarrassing video away from genuinely rolling on the ground in laughter, and if Adrien almost _cataclysm_ 'ed the projector halfway through their presentation, well, no one had to know.

A year and some months later, Marinette graduated at the top of her class in Fashion and Design, already starting a project with Gabriel to begin the training that would be required in taking over the company. Adrien graduated a month after her with a degree in Business and Physics, immediately investing in a Master's program. To no one's surprise at all, he would later become one of the university's most beloved physics professor. 

Alya climbed the social latter until she stood victorious at the very top with a golden crown on her head, a world-renowned journalist through and through and the highest trusted Ladybug source often cited in history books and research dissertations alike. Nino, on the other hand, became a DJ, opening one of Paris' most famous and prestigious nightclubs, housing world-popular bands such as Kitty Section almost regularly. Despite never officially getting married, the two moved in and gave birth to a small son, whose name echoed Adrien's own. Chloe started her own beauty business and became a regular investor in Nino's club, a heart of ice thawed through the years of kindness her best friends consistently gave her.

Sometime further down the line Marinette and Adrien welcomed little Emma Agreste-Dupain-Cheng into the world (Adrien had insisted he take her name after their wedding, but considering she was taking over his father's company the compromise of Agreste-Dupain-Cheng was made). She was a small little bundle of joy, so often spoiled by both Tom and Sabine _and_ Gabriel and Nathalie that Marinette began to contemplate alternative babysitters. Not that Auntie Alya and Uncle Nino were any better. And don't even begin to mention Auntie Chloe.

As for the latter of the two grandparents, Gabriel's slow retirement allowed him to give his well-worked assistant a break. No one was quite sure what their relationship was or had become, but no one asked. It was the company that mattered in this old age, and company they gave one another.

And though he'd never admit it, when Emma grew old enough to begin asking for stories, Gabriel told her of the two greatest heroes of Paris—her parents, the Miraculous Ladybug and Chat Noir.


End file.
